Borderline Sicilia On Board the Sea Watch 3: The Intervention of the Libyan Coast Guard Brings Death and Refoulment

Press release – The landing operation of the Sea Watch 3 at the port of Pozzallo came to a close this morning at midday. Police, carabinieri, Frontex and EASO agents were waiting on the quayside, as well as staff from the main governmental organisations and NGOs active in Sicily. There were also workers and legal assistants from Borderline Sicily.

The Sea Watch 3 docks in at Pozzallo. Photo: Viola Gastaldi

After The Landing, Human Rights On Hold: The Case Of The Extraordinary Reception Centre at Rosolini

Mohamed and Ahmed (not their real names) arrived in Sicily on the first of July. The Swedish ship BKV 002 to which they were transferred while still at sea brought them into the port of Catania along with 650 other migrants and 9 bodies. “It was extraordinary to think that just one step more and we were in Europe” is the phrase they used on arrival. At least, it was in our first meeting.

Migrants at the port of Augusta (Province of Syracuse)

"They Leave As People, They Arrive As Ghosts” Shipwrecks And Push-Backs At Sea. Italy Closes The Doors, Including To Those Who Manage To Arrive

On June 12th a Swedish ship belonging to Frontex landed at Catania, with 356 migrants on board and 8 bodies. The survivors spoke of a dozen missing and the collapse of their rubber boat, packed with people far beyond its capacity. Only a few days later, a group of Sudanese migrants reported a boat which had broken apart after two days at sea, from which only a dozen people had been saved. Other refugees reported having met Syrian women and children in Libya: they had just been “brought back” to the departure point by the local Coast Guard and themselves told of having seen other small wooden boats go under.

The Italian Coast Guard vessel Diciotti in port at Catania

Migrants, the CIE* and the hotspots reminding of Lager. Between dirt, cold and loss of dignity

MeridioNews.it – The first report of the National Guarantor for the Rights of Detained and Semi-Detained Persons focuses on a long series of shortfalls which characterise the stay of foreign citizens arriving in Italy. In this context, structural problems are added to procedures casting doubt on whether rules are being respected.

New Rejections, Arrests and Hotspots: The Migrants Italy Does Not Want to Protect But Continues to Exploit

Around 250 people in just one landing: this is the number of migrants, almost all Moroccans, who were handed rejection notices immediately after arriving in Pozzallo over a week ago on board the Golfo Azzurro. Photocopied rejection notices which impose that you leave the Italian state within seven days, via Fiumicino airport in Rome. This absurd, illegal, unconstitutional procedure has been carried out yet again, leading to the collective rejections of which Italy was found guilty by the European Court of Human Rights.

The Aquarius in port at Catania

Recovered or Saved? Criminalisation of the Sea Missions and Still More Slaughter At Sea

A few hours ago the news broke of the latest, horrendous shipwreck off the coast of Libya, in which it is thought around 240 people lost their lives, according to the account of the NGO Pro-Activa Open Arms, which recovered five cadavers found near to two empty rubber boats. On March 20th another 38 deaths were confirmed off the Libyan coast. The migrants had been drifting on two rubber boats which were then “saved” by the Libyan Coast Guard.

The Ocean Carrier docks in at Pozzallo

Breaking the Silence

Pozzallo, Augusta, Catania, Lampedusa, Palermo: people continue to arrive in Sicily, crossing the sea from Libya. In the bays of the coastline, the rescue missions continue, as do the shipwrecks and death. Migrants are dying in the freezer trucks which transport them like the cargo they have become from the deserts to the Libyan coast, from where the attempt to reach Europe is usually made. Those who found themselves cited in the daily papers last week make up only a small percentage of the thousands who are trafficked every day. Whoever does make it to Italy tries to explain the horrors they have seen, far too often left unheard.

Photo: The arrival of the Golfo Azzuro into the port of Pozzallo

Minors in Tent Cities and Hotspots: Pozzallo, Augusta, Catania and Messina

The year 2016 ended with more arrivals, more deaths, more missing persons. The year 2017 has begun with the proposal for new detention centres and other limitations on migrants' freedom of movement. The criminal policies of Fortress Europe increasingly require new discussions, commemorations and real solidarity. On December 24^th, 111 migrants landed at Pozzallo, but the daily news recounts nothing but the immediate arrest of two alleged boat drivers, which bring the number of arrestees in the Province of Ragusa to 200.

Photo: the Pozzallo hotspot - Lucia Borghi

Messina: A Mega Tent-City for Migrants in the Old 'Gasparro' Barracks. The €1,932,000 Contract Already Announced in the Official Gazette. And that's not all...

By Stampalibera.it

In a few months' time the former barracks of 'Gasparro' in Messina (in the urban area of Bisconte) will be transformed into one of the largest centres in Italy for the forced “welcoming” of those migrants awaiting the authorities' decision on whether they will be eventually relocated to other structures for asylum seekers in Europe or – as will be the case for the vast majority of them – to be deported by military force to their countries of origin. Dozens of tents and containers will be installed next to the buildings of the 'Gasparro' (where around 200 young migrants have already been stuck for three years) allowing for the tripling or even quadrupling of the number of residents, and – just a short walk from the town centre – replicating the infamous failure of the “Mineo” model of reception.

[photo: Enrico di Giacomo]

Refugees at a Distance: New Victims Amid the Complete Silence of Fortress Europe

“Europe talks about migrants as refugees only when they're at a distance, still in the countries of transit or where a war is unfolding. When we manage to cross the borders, we immediately become simply numbers, talked about as nothing but a problem.” 'L'. is from Senegal, and just a little over 20 years old, the last five of those years spent in a journey to reach Fortress Europe, where he arrived three years ago. He tries to stay calm and composed while speaking, even if the resulting tone makes his anger and frustration clear enough, and the pain which he tries to swallow down every day.

Market Commodities: Unaccompanied Minors Fleeing Without Any Protection

“I got out of Italy. Now I'm in a safe country.” 'A's message arrives early in the morning, a young Eritrean man who we met at Pozzallo and then followed throughout his first month at a centre for minors in the province of Syracuse. From the moment he arrived, 'A' had continued to repeat the first sentence he heard in Italian: “You are in Italy, a safe country.”

Why The Death Continues

Little more than a hundred euros and a few weeks' wait. That's the price any Italian citizen has to pay and the procedure to follow if they want a passport. Who knows how many people who request and make use of their own document are aware that what to them is a banal and routine operation, is beyond the reach of thousands of others, indeed is impossible. Who knows if European citizens think even for a moment that to have the same freedom of movement there are people who, even today, are forced to pay with their very lives, to waste away in prison for months and to sell their bodies.

#Overthefortress: A Two-Month Journey from Sicily to Rome Within and Beyond the Central Mediterranean Route

From Meltingpot.org

Forty stops, 3,400km, one camper: join the journey and support the crowdfunder.

The #overthefortress camper departing at the Port of Igoumenitsa will land in Southern Italy for a project of investigation and independent communication side by side with migrants and groups in the area, to examine common sites and dominant narratives, and to provide space to a politics of welcoming, solidarity and civil engagement.

Migrant Landing at Pozzallo: “Improvised, Overcrowded Centres, The Closed Borders Are Pushing the Reception System into Collapse”

From IlFattoQuotidiano.it

Paola Ottaviano from Borderlin Sicily, an association of legal experts which is extremely active in assisting migrants, explains the situation of the Sicilian Hotspot: “The Italian system of helping migrants has not been reorganised, nor rethought through so as to manage this consistent influx of people.”

Remembrance by the Few, Silence of the Many. Three Landings and 29 Bodies at Pozzallo.

"I left after having spent 40 days in a bunker in Libya. I was threatened with death, robbed of my documents, tied up and beaten. I lost all sense of time, I couldn't tell when it was night or day. It was only on arrival in Italy that I properly understood how much time had passed. Looking at myself, I hardly recognise who I am anymore.”

Photo: the MOAS Topaz Responder, at Pozzallo.

Unaccompanied Minors: When Reception Is Seen Only As a Challenge

“New guys arrive, but their problems aren't over”, commented some migrants outside the Hotspot at Pozzallo. Yesterday 286 migrants arrived at the Ragusan port, including around 20 unaccompanied minors. Young people of 15, 16, 17 – but also 13 and younger, such as those to whom we had already introduced ourselves. Last Thursday a delegation from the OSCE (Organisation Security and Co-operation in Europe) visited the Pozzallo Hotspot, having already stopped at the CARA* at Mineo. In the hours immediately prior to the visit, we assisted in a large number of transfers from the Hotspot to centres nearby. Among the migrants leaving there were many unaccompanied minors who therefore, due to a coincidence that was predictable enough, were not so numerous during the institutional visit.

More Vulnerable People, Less Protection. Prolonged Detention in Pozzallo and Augusta.

Fifteen migrants dead at sea, including women and children.

The notices of death in the Mediterranean are ever more frequent and standardised, and the images of rescue missions and the disembarking leave only a minimal functional space to call into question European responsibility and to commend Italian work. Faces and bodies quickly disappear, usually destined either for a far-off burial away from the view of friends, or to eek out an exhausting survival in a country which is shown to be ever less democratic and welcoming.

"Half a Human"

It is already 7 pm but the sun is still blazing. Not a single shadow on the highway that leads from the tiny city center of Marina di Modica to the heartland. In front of us, S. rides his bicycle with his backpack on. He is soaked in sweat and forced to to cover the distance to downtown Marina di Modica as quickly as possible. Since recently, he is accommodated with another 27 migrants in the new first reception center of the province of Ragusa. The cooperative Azione Sociale, which has operated the hotspot in Pozzallo until a month ago, manages this newly opened center as well as a new facility for migrants in Modica.

Ph. Lucia Borghi

The Extraordinary Reception of Unaccompanied Minors: The Ragusa Prefecture Looks to Open New Centres

At the end of July, the Chamber of Deputies approved the legislation of a new decree related to urgent financial measures, proposing “extraordinary measures for the reception of unaccompanied foreign minors”. These emergency measures have a a decidedly unconstitutional aspect, as ASGI* has also observed in an open letter, and which practically gives a free reign for the creation of new Extraordinary Reception Centres (CAS*) for unaccompanied minors.

Dozens of corpses on the Libyan beaches. The body of yet another victim of the crossing arrives at Pozzallo

On July 23^rd the media reported the news of around forty bodies given up by the sea and left on the Libyan beach of Sabrata. This number was destined to rise at the weekend, when a total of 87 bodies were recovered from the same beach.